Mexico Senate OKs New Tobacco Restrictions

The Senate of Mexico on Dec. 14 approved amendments to the General Law on Tobacco Control that include a complete ban on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship. They also prohibit smoking and vaping—including the use of heated tobacco products—in any indoor public spaces, as specified by the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which Mexico ratified in 2004.

Once the law is referred to the President and published, Mexico will become 100 percent smoke-free and join a community of 23 countries in the Americas that entirely ban indoor smoking.

Anti-smoking activists welcomed the development. “We applaud President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and the head of the Undersecretariat of Prevention and Health Promotion at the Mexican Secretariat of Health, Dr. Hugo López-Gatell, for playing a pivotal role in the approval of the reform, and all the deputies, senators and government officials for protecting the health of their people and standing up to the tobacco industry’s persistent interference,” the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids wrote on its website.